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Summary: A must read for those who seek to be authentic
Review: Dr. Phil McGraw hits a home run with this book. Using plain English and terms each person can clearly understand, Dr Phil explains the void in people who live unathentic lives and how to become authentic. The book contains thorough discussions and exercises that help you to create a journal of yur own personal history. The author makes you examine your life to see the relevant and influencing events, people, and decisions that have shaped you and your view of self. This book is a wake up call for those who are sick and tired of going with the flow and being unauthentic. I highly recommend this book to each person on our planet!
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Summary: The Greatest Gift Of All
Review: Dr. Phil delivers the goods again!
What I like most about his books is that even though I am reading, it's as if he is right there in my living room speaking directly to me! His matter of fact approach is inspiring to me. And the test and graphs presented in the book provide a good starting point to see where you are in your life.I appreciated Dr. Phil's explanation of how my internal conversations and the different labels I had put upon myself are not realty but preconceived notions I had believed to be true. It is very freeing and satisfying to live a life without the restrictions of not being my true self. One sentence from the book had a profound influence on me and that was "one of the greatest gifts you can offer the other people in your life is your authentic self, rather than you fictional self. " There's another book called "WORKING ON YOURSELF DOESN¹T WORK" by Ariel & Shya Kane that I highly recommend reading. This book has a non-work, non-judgmental approach to finding your authentic self that has lasting and fulfilling effects.
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Summary: Ridiculous and Farfetched
Review: After reading the first 30 pages of this book I could only think that Dr. Phil must be kidding. Creating a self is a life's work --not an overnight venture that can be accomplished by reading this book. Sad. Very sad indeed!!
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Summary: The Best Book I Have Ever Read!!
Review: This is an amazing book that is sure to improve the life of anyone who reads it! Dr. Phil does a great job of explaining how, once you understand your past, you can use it to create any life that you want. He uses great examples and tells the best stories. Dr. Phil does a great job of making this book fun to read as well as life changing.
I just have to say, job well done Dr. Phil. This book is sure to change lives for decades to come. I know that it has changed mine!!
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Summary: FANTASTIC BOOK - NOT ENOUGH STARS FOR THIS ONE!
Review: As a counsellor and one who has studied behavioural psychology extensively, this will definitely be a book that will be highly recommended reading material. McGraw challenges the reader to take a look beyond one's mirror image and discover who the individual truly is inside. It is extremely thought provoking and readers will find themselves doing some deep soul searching to come up with honest answers. Sometimes finding one's true self is a painful experience, for many people are quite willing to identify their strengths but are less enthusiastic when it comes to identifying (and admitting) their weaknesses and imperfections. The people who come through our lives and leave their mark, the choices we make and the critical events that happen in our lives, all determine to a certain degree, who we are and what we will become. Genetics also plays a part as well as our early childhood experiences. However, this book is really a book in understanding one's inner self. Of course, our life is created from the inside out! Those who fail to see the value of the book, are missing out on in important lesson in life: the basic psychology of "what makes us tick." McGraw has written a dramatically poignant, frank and intellectual book that enables the reader to "pull down the masks and walls," maximize their full potential, and live the life of the person they were intended to be. If one does not comprehend the purpose and significance of the book, they are sadly missing out on an insightful journey into self-discovery. "Self Matters" is a fantastic book; there are not enough stars for this one!
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Summary: Knowledge with Power and Clarity
Review: As a lawyer I live with so many "double speak words" that a clear and usable treatment of such a critical subject as my self-image and self concept, was not only refreshing but critical in my life. I read the book in 2 days and now have started back through.
As Dr. McGraw isolated so specifically on the few really impactful happenings in my life the intimidation of a past so busy, that it was overwhelming, became managable for the first time in my life.
Self Matters challenges you to focus on certain key moments, choices and people and to profile yourself before the happening and compare that to your self image after the happening. Bingo!! I now see why I do some of the dumb stuff I do! I was living a personal truth that now looks insane.
With clear language, "dots" very close together and some great humor Self Matters is sure to become a classic. Dr. McGraw is so easy to relate to that I found my defenses totally disarmed. Having never been molested, beaten or abandoned I was so validated to hear him use everyday examples instead of marking the book extreme stories that would have left me out.
A great addition to your Dr. Phil library.
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Summary: Self Matters: A Professional Psychologist' perspective
Review: As a professional therapist I must say that Dr. Phil McGraw's Self Matters is a powerful and life changing book that has answered a number of questions that have plagued me, and I'll bet millions of others. Dr. McGraw's handling of a complex subject is eloquently brilliant! So many others TRY to make the concept of "self" understandable but fall short, however well intended. Choosing to avoid all of the New Age, "inner-self" type rhetoric Dr. McGraw treats the subject of who you have become and importantly how with a directness that is his trade mark. Leading you through the history of your life with a focus and a purpose he gives you the tools and focus to take even the most difficult past and turn it into personal power. Dr. McGraw chooses stories from his own life that are decidedly relateaable. Rather than using dramatic, headline news type sensationalism he shows us how each of us have events that are important to each of us, even if not to everyone else. By leading us to examine both external and internal factors about ourselves, he leads us to deal with reality of life yet claim the power of self definition. Concepts such as PERSONAL TRUTH, AUTHENTIC SELF, DEFINING MOMENTS, CRITICAL CHOICES, PIVOTAL PEOPLE AND INTERNAL DIALOGUE were life altering for me and will become part of therapuetic regimine as I treat my patient population. I did not think it was possible but SELF MATTERS is even better than LIFE STRATEGIES AND RELATIONSHIP RESCUE. Well done and thank you.
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Summary: Find Yourself by Living--Not in this boring and foolish book
Review: It amazes me that a well-educated person like Dr. Phil can try to sell to readers the idea that finding the self can be accomplished by reading one of his books. Nonsense!!! In my view if you want to find yourself invite some friends over to your house, go out to dinner with a loved one and find some romance. Perhaps Dr. Phil needs to find himself--since the old Dr. Phil, the one who wrote a couple of good books before this one, has somehow disappeared!
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Summary: An Important Subject Badly Handled
Review: Caution: This book contains many coarse words rarely found in self-help books, which are unnecessary to the main message and only serve to create cheap shocks to get readers' attentions. As someone who loved Life Strategies and Relationship Rescue (and the workbooks that go with them), I was astonished at how bad this book was in pursuing a very important subject . . . following your own inner voice and touching the inspiring passion within you. Dr. McGraw's main point is that you should fill "your life with what's genuinely important to you . . . ." Most people have been so negatively influenced by past experiences, negative self-talk, and social pressures that some archeology is needed to locate "your authentic self." Most people, by contrast, run their lives through a "fictional self" which is the result of accidental events and what others want. The book contains many exercises to help you perform that self-learning, and then to act on your new insights. "If you don't fight for the chance to live that uniqueness, no on will." I agree with these premises based on having attended many seminars and workshops in this area (the best ones were given by fiction author Dan Wakefield and self-help guru Tony Robbins), many years of meditation, and continuous work on overcoming my own social and self-imposed limits. What I don't agree with is the way that Dr. McGraw sets out to help readers. The book seems to build from the therapeutic process he uses with patients. But the book sets up a different situation. You are encouraged to do this work on your own. I think that shift is a big mistake. In the workshops I have attended on this subject, most of the benefit came from talking with another workshop attendee who listened to what I had to say and reacted to it in a helpful way . . . much like a therapist would. Most people have a lot of heavy duty issues to deal with, and expecting them to make progress in these painful areas on their own is a mistake . . . and could even be harmful in some cases. So, I don't think the book will work very well except for those who need help in this area the least. If you decide to read this book, I suggest that you find another person who will do it with you so that you can share your observations with one another. Please note that Dr. McGraw discourages you from doing this, and spends a lot of time describing the ways that friends and family may try to sabotage your progress. I disagree based on my experiences.. I also found the self-diagnostic examinations in the book to be either too obvious or unusable. After reading three questions, it was perfectly obvious what he was driving at. As the worst example of this problem, the book has blatantly obvious appendices A and B for the internal factors that influence you. Nowhere could I find a way to score these questions, while the text blithely discusses what your point totals mean. Other signs of sloppiness are everywhere in the form of mind-numbing repetition that serves little purpose. About a third of the book superficially covers the same material about your authentic self. Yet, the explanation of the concept stays at an extremely elementary level that may make it hard to grasp. For example, you shouldn't do what pleases others . . . unless it pleases you to do so. Now, a lot of people are going to have trouble differentiating from pleasing to avoid problems, and pleasing as part of a rewarding sense of self. The book is only clear about extreme examples, like those involving abuse. Without the annoying repetition, this book would be about half its size. By the way, the key elements of your authentic self are in chapter 11. I was also astonished at his use of unimpressive personal examples involving himself and Ms. Oprah Winfrey. I doubt if his single-minded development of a successful practice with his father will strike too many other people as a major sell-out and source of unhappiness. These examples make the book seem inauthentic and forced. I liked his idea of locating the ten defining moments, the seven critical choices, and five pivotal people. I enjoyed doing those exercises. Making people more aware of self-talk and improving it is a good idea. The advice would have been better if it had included meditation to quiet self-talk as well. Identifying fixed and limiting beliefs is a good idea, but the material here for changing them is below average. The "Five-Step Action Plan" is pretty unnatural to use. I suspect that most people will find it hard to use without the emotional support of discussing it with someone else. One of the book's stated purposes was to make the reader excited about the subject. I found this book the least exciting one I had read in this area. If this book had been tested out with 100 people prior to publication (which I suspect it was not), it could easily have been improved. Hopefully, an improved edition will emerge at some point. Finally, I must observe that if Dr. McGraw was going to write a book on this subject, it should have preceded Life Strategies and Relationship Rescue. If you do not know who you are and what your purpose is, how can you do those activities properly? I didn't think Dr. McGraw faced up to this contradiction in the book. Presumably, he had all of this knowledge for many years. Why is he sharing it in the wrong order?
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Summary: I think Phil McGraw is channeling Ayn Rand! And I love it!
Review: Dr. Phil McGraw does it again! This book is crackerjack! He offers the advice everyone else is just too spineless and wishy-washy to tell us. He's not always everyone's favorite, but he is always right! And he's going to tell it like it Tee-Eye is! He's Ayn Rand with a Y chromosone. He really wants to help people get their sad and depressing lives together, but he isn't here to coddle no body. And if this new book doesn't do it, nothing else will! You go Phil! This book is a paint by numbers way to find your Authentic Self. It's that kick in the butt you need to find who you were before the world got their hands all over you and made you think you were a victim. It's the operating instructions that you lost somewhere behind the couch with your Dorito bags and empty diet soda cans. This book tells us to put down that cheesecake and get real and get to work. After I read this book. I got a really lazy "I'm -a-victim" whiny supervisor fired. I learned the meaning of boundaries, I'll tell you that. And I then went into the big boss and got a raise and my supervisor's job. I did all this in a supposedly depressed economy! That's how completely pumped up this book got me!
God bless you, Dr. Phil. I wish we could clone you like that sheep, Dolly in England. Then we could have twice the advice!
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